


Wandering About

by ladygray99



Category: Numb3rs
Genre: Canon - TV, Episode Tag, Episode: s06e16 Cause and Effect, F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-04-22
Updated: 2010-04-22
Packaged: 2017-10-09 02:18:42
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,506
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/81903
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ladygray99/pseuds/ladygray99
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Don and Larry chat at the reception.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Wandering About

**Author's Note:**

> Spoilers: Big ones for Growin' Up and Cause and Effect but really I guess for the last six years.  
> Notes: So munchkinofdoom made me some awesome icons of Larry sniffing raspberries. In return I offered to write some Don fic for her. It instantly turned into Don, and Larry fic with the two of them just lightly drunk chatting away at the reception.  
> Beta: riverotter1951, aries_taurus

Don handed Larry another flute of Champagne before finding a seat on the couch next to him where they could watch the happy couple chat with Liz and Colby. Don was feeling loose and happy, a combination of alcohol and being rather in love.

Larry took a large swallow of his Champagne. "Go easy on that. You're sort of on call now."

Larry peered through the bubbles. "I suppose I am."

"Hey, you volunteered."

Larry looked slightly distant as he took another sip. "Yes I suppose I did."

"You gonna to be up for it?" Don asked. He had to. It had been more than a bit of a surprise when Larry volunteered to take Charlie's case load.

"I have managed a case or two on my own while Charles was having issues with his clearance."

"Yeah, that was a case or two. This is full time, real deal now."

Larry chuckled a little. "I have a vague memory of a conversation with Charles. It was several years ago now and I was asking him if putting together bits of math for his brother was really appropriate use of his genius? It is interesting how the universe can push one about until one is facing in completely the opposite direction and yet feel as though they have been going in a straight line."

"For what it's worth Larry I asked Charlie the same question more than once. Hell, I tried to throw him off cases."

"I recall. At which point the legendary Eppes stubbornness took over."

Don watched Amita feed Charlie a bite of cake with her fingers. "You know before I came home, back to LA, I was engaged."

"I was unaware of that."

Don took a large swallow of his own drink. "I didn't tell Charlie. That's how close we were. I got engaged and it didn't even cross my mind to pick up the phone and tell him."

"And now you will find it difficult not to run up your long distance bill."

"What's the time difference between here and England?"

"Currently, they are seven hours ahead."

"Right." Don nursed his beer a little more. "Oh, hey, I didn't get to say but that was a nice ceremony you did. Wasn't too technical but very them."

"Thank you for that. I wasn't exactly given a lot of time to prepare remarks."

"Nah. It was good. Said what needed to be said. Got them hitched. No one giggled and no one cried."

"Have you had any thoughts for your own wedding yet?" Don looked sharply at Larry. "I saw you ask. Congratulations and I do understand you not wanting to upstage your brother's party."

"I should. It would serve him right. He's been upstaging me for years." Larry only smiled. "I don't know, ceremony wise. I mean Robin was raised Catholic but she doesn't go to church or anything. I've got my thing going now. I don't know, an FBI agent and a prosecutor getting married? We'll probably just find a judge. I think that would probably be very us."

"It probably would."

Don smiled as Robin chatted with his dad over a tray of nibbles. "How about you Larry? Charlie's hitched. I'm taking the dive. You got anyone in your sights?"

Larry firmly shook his head. "No. No. No. Good heavens, no. I am on the verge of possibly one of the largest breakthroughs in cosmology since Kepler derived his laws of planetary motion. Romance is not part of the equation at present. No."

Don chuckled. "No time for romance but enough time to get hauled out of bed in the middle of the night to do bullet path analysis?"

Larry looked a bit guilty and stared back into his drink. "I find I sleep better at night knowing that there is a solid scientific mind keeping watch over the crime of this city. Even if that mind is my own."

Now Don really did laugh. "Oh boy, Larry. You are a lost cause now."

"I do not feel my concern for the law and order of the greater Los Angeles area is something to be… concerned about."

"Larry, I was born and raised here and as far as I'm concerned I'm sheriff of this town. Anyone rides in looking to cause problems, they become my problem and you can bet money every law enforcement officer, from the LAPD beat cops on up, feels the same way. Especially if they're local. I mean I don't know about David and Colby but Liz and Nikki, especially Nikki. LA is their turf and don't you go messing with it."

"Well, I will do my best to defend Charles' turf while he is at Cambridge."

"You know we've got a pool going at the office? How many days will Charlie be in England before Scotland Yard or MI5 or someone calls up wanting to confirm that the loony American mathematician actually knows how to solve a crime."

"And how much to get in?"

"Ten bucks."

Larry squinted across the room at Charlie and Amita. "Six weeks. Based on what I know of Charles' attention span and how quickly he adapts to new academic environments. Six weeks."

"You're more generous than I am. I put him down for three."

"You forget he is also a newlywed. He will have other distractions as well."

Don realized that Charlie's sex life was something he hadn't factored into his own equation. "Yeah, fair enough." Don shook his head a little. "Charlie is married. Charlie is married! Chuck went and got married before me. How the hell did that happen?"

Don tried not to be offended by Larry's laughter. "Charles agreed to be the doctoral advisor of a very persistent young lady who decided, some time ago I believe, that she was going to be Dr. Mrs. Dr. Charles Eppes and then simply waited for him to catch up with the program. That is how that happened."

"Yeah, that I believe."

"Honestly I am somewhat surprised Amita followed through with her original target selection as it were."

Don frowned at Larry. "Why wouldn't she? I mean other than the fact that Chuck can't cook, can't drive and has never picked up his own laundry."

"Amita first set her sights on a rapidly rising star of mathematics, a crown price of the ivory tower, a high priest of the academic elite."

"Yeah, and?"

Larry turned around to face Don a little better. "Let me ask you this, who wasn't at your brother's wedding?"

Don though about it. Liz had drawn the short straw and had stay at the office. Their mom hadn't been there. That had sucked in its own way. Then Don though about Larry's previous words. There were no academics. The great Dr. Charles Eppes got married and no one from CalSci was there. Not a single professor or even a student. Who had been there? The FBI's local violent crime unit. And who was invited to the party? No one from the academic world. Not even Larry's new equation monkey.

"Shit." Don whispered. "Have we really dragged him that far away from all of you guys?"

"I don't think dragged is the proper word. I do believe he went very willingly. And he has not abandoned his more theoretical pursuits as evident by his cognitive emergence work, he simply has experiences now that his fellow academics are not fully in positions to relate to."

"Getting shot at."

"For starters. There was a faculty luncheon not long ago and Charles was sat down next to a junior professor. He spent most of the lunch trying to explain how humidity can influence the onset of rigor mortis and thereby alter time of death estimations. I don't believe the young man ate very much of his lunch."

Don grinned. He couldn't help but find some morbid amusement in the story. "So everyone just thinks Chuck is creepy now. Oh well. I guess he's in good company. Are you going to be handle all the gross stuff?"

"I believe I have handled my self well to date."

"How about your new equation monkey?"

"According to Charles young Dr. Bahnoff managed to produce equations even after witnessing the immediate effects of a drive by shooting. That is one of the reasons I chose him."

Don couldn't argue with that. Heck, Charlie had heaved his guts out after seeing his first dead body. If the kid could hold up better than that then Don wasn't about to say no to the math. "Okay, well, let's hope for stupid criminals for the next year anyways."

"Why not wish for no criminals at all?"

"I'm trying to be an optimist, not completely delusional."

Larry raised his glass that held a last sip of Champagne. "Well I will send my wishes as far as they can go and wish for a crime free City of Angels."

Don raised his own glass with a grin. "Sure. Why not? Here's to being out of job for the best possible reasons."


End file.
